Thursday, April 13, 2017

U.S. Air Force Drops 'Mother Of All Bombs' On The Islamic State In Afghanistan

The U.S. military said it conducted a strike on an ISIS-K tunnel complex in the Achin district of Nangarhar province, Afghanistan, on Thursday.

A U.S. aircraft dropped a GBU-43 Massive Ordnance Air Blast, also known as a MOAB, as part of ongoing efforts to defeat ISIS-Khorasan in Afghanistan, according to a statement from U.S. Central Command.

The strike aimed to minimize the risk to Afghan and U.S. forces conducting clearing operations in the area, the release said.

"As ISIS-K's losses have mounted, they are using IEDs, bunkers and tunnels to thicken their defense," Gen. John W. Nicholson, the top commander in Afghanistan, said in the release. "This is the right munition to reduce these obstacles and maintain the momentum of our offensive against ISIS-K."

The MOAB is not a penetrator weapon and is primarily intended for soft to medium surface targets covering extended areas and targets in a contained environment such as a deep canyon or within a cave system.[citation needed] However, multiple strikes with lower yield ordnance may be more effective and can be delivered by fighter/bombers such as the F-16 with greater stand-off capability than the C-130 and C-17.[citation needed] High altitude carpet-bombing with much smaller 230-to-910-kilogram (500 to 2,000 lb) bombs delivered via heavy bombers such as the B-52, B-2, or the B-1 is also highly effective at covering large areas.[8]

Either a diversion as the US and China plan on removing KIm Jung Un or a message to these nations that the USA will employ whatever weapons it needs to in the forthcoming battle. Peace and Happy Easter to all.

About Me

I have been involved in numerous computer science projects since the 1980s, as well as developing numerous web projects since 1996.
These blogs are a summation of all the information that I read and catalog pertaining to the subjects that interest me.